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Other special session topics bubble up

Leadership vows to keep days narrowly focused on Hard 50

The leadership mantra for the upcoming special session is clear: Get to Topeka, fix the "Hard 50" sentencing procedure, head home.

Gov. Sam Brownback, flanked by a phalanx of blue-uniformed police officers and be-suited prosecutors, laid down the ground rules Tuesday when he signed the proclamation calling legislators back to the Statehouse Sept. 3 to Sept. 5.

"My request is that it should be a one-topic special session," Brownback said, adding that House and Senate leaders agreed with him.

But while leadership may squelch all but one piece of legislation, other state business will be conducted during the session. "One topic" is the mantra, but "one bill" was the standard outlined by Brownback and others who pushed for the session, which is estimated to cost about $40,000 per day.

The state constitution mandates that the Legislature review the governor's appointments whenever it is in session. Brownback said there is a slate of candidates awaiting confirmation, including Department of Administration Secretary Jim Clark, and legislators will have to act on them. But he does not expect that to bog down the session.

"There is one legislative topic, is what my hope is," Brownback said. "By the constitution any appointments that have been made must be taken up."

One of the appointments up for confirmation will be Brownback's pick for a Court of Appeals position, an appointee as yet unnamed.

Before this year appointees for the state's second-highest court were chosen by a non-partisan nominating committee that made public all the candidates. Brownback's refusal to name his candidates under the new selection process has proven controversial.

Sen. David Haley, D-Kansas City, though he attended Tuesday's signing and spoke in favor of addressing the hard 50 issue as soon as possible, said the accelerated time line for Brownback's judicial appointment to be confirmed in the special session "does lend an air of reasonable suspicion to the timing of this."

“When Attorney General Derek Schmidt requested the governor to call a special session, Schmidt suggested it be called in mid-September," Hensley said. "Instead, Brownback scheduled it for September 3rd – conveniently just four days after the deadline for naming a nominee to the Court of Appeals. It is obvious that he wants to rush this appointment through the Senate quickly to avoid any organized opposition to his nominee."

Schmidt, when he requested the special session, asked that it occur no later than mid-September.

Haley said he was concerned about having enough time to look into the governor's Court of Appeals pick.

"I think that for those other appointments that could be more easily vetted it would be appropriate (to hold confirmation hearings during the special session)," Haley said. "With this one, I'm hesitant, especially now 30 days out from the special session and not even knowing who might be appointed for one of the most important judicial positions in the state."

Haley is the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, which will be busy reviewing the hard 50 bill and vetting the judicial nominee when the special session begins.

Other legislators will be idle until a bill appears in their chamber. Rep. Marc Rhoades, R-Newton, the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, said that spare time might be more efficiently used in informational briefings on zero-based budgeting. That method of appropriations, which requires agencies to start from zero and justify each dollar they receive regardless of what they received in previous years, is favored by conservatives.

Rep. Ramon Gonzalez, R-Perry, a police chief who spoke in favor of the special session Tuesday, was adamant that the session should be brief, but said such side activities could be fine as long as they don't result in additional legislation.

"We can have info sessions, but don't bring them to the (House) floor," Gonzalez said.

House Speaker Ray Merrick, R-Stilwell, agreed.

“Legislators are free to schedule meetings as they see fit to best utilize their time in Topeka, as long as it doesn’t interfere with the special session," Merrick said in an emailed statement.

An anti-abortion group out of Wichita has told the Associated Press it plans to lobby for a "fetal heartbeat bill" that could ban abortions after six weeks of pregnancy.

When asked if he had talked to such groups about the need to keep the session focused on the hard 50, Brownback said he had spoken to House and Senate leaders, who have the authority to bottleneck legislation.

"I've reached out to legislative leadership and I've asked them if they see this the way I do, that this should be a one-topic session, and they've agreed," Brownback said. "I haven't reached out to the broad community."

Haley said the last special session, in 2005, remained narrowly focused in large part because the entire Legislature was engrossed in the topic, school finance.